Anaïs Nin: Delta of Venus When she saw that he was dissolved with pleasure, she stopped, divining that perhaps if she deprived him now he might make a gesture towards fulfilment. At first he made no motion. His sex was quivering, and he was tormented with desire … Marianne grew desperate. She pushed his hand away, took his sex into her mouth again, and with her two hands she encircled his sexual parts, caressed him and absorbed him until he came. He leaned over with gratitude, tenderness, and murmured, “You are the first woman, the first woman, the first woman …” … [Read more...] about Forget Morrissey’s ‘bulbous salutation’, here are my good sex awards

But, as ever, it’s all about packaging, and Joanne was as much of a pose as Artpop. In many ways, the ballad-free, dancefloor-primed Chromatica represents not only Gaga’s most personal record, but her most straightforward. Obviously there’s a conceptual framework – that title, despite sounding like a Mac software update, actually represents a planet anchored by equality and inhabited by “kindness punks” – but it feels much lighter than before. As Gaga said in a recent interview with Zane Lowe, she prioritised “simple messaging”, a phrase that would have been reverse-Warholed up its own backside a few years ago. … [Read more...] about Lady Gaga: Chromatica review – Gaga rediscovers the riot on her most personal album

For quite a lot of people, the first thing they will do is go to the pub. The right to a draught beer, a pint pulled by the landlord, to perch on a stool on a carpet of dubious content, to chat s*** with your neighbours, would have been in Magna Carta if only it hadn't been written by tri-lingual landowners. … [Read more...] about One day this will be over. And what will you do?